Mujeres, teatro, música y variedades: de las boleras y flamencas a las bailarinas de danza española (1885-1927)

Abstract

The new airs of modernity that were circulating in Spain in the late nineteenth century are projected in the performing arts through their protagonists, theatres, audiences, art forms and critics. In dance, the response to these novelties is seen in the transformation of the profile of the women who took to the stage. It concerns female performers such as the idealised romantic ballerina, the singular classical Spanish bolera dancer or the colourful and characterful flamenco “bailaora” who were replaced by other women from within the new genres of variety entertainment. These people, places and settings act as experimental platforms for creating new content. The aim of these pages is to provide some key points regarding the profile of these variety show artists and to advance the argument that they were the transitional link between the late nineteenth-century “boleras-flamencas” dancers and the new model of the twentieth century “Spanish Dance” dancer which was born in the Edad de Plata and reached maturity in the 1940s and 1950s.